This family quit their jobs and hit the road with two kids under two

BRYONY Sumner once took a flight with a baby and never wanted to leave the house again. So her husband’s idea for a family adventure took a lot of convincing.

“I WISH we could do that!”

This is the response we hear the most when we tell people that we are travelling Australia fulltime with our kids. We quit our jobs, packed up our house and hit the road just over four months ago.

The seed was planted a couple of years ago as we were watching TV. Our almost-two-year-old was in bed. Our four-month-old was on his play mat, refusing to even look tired, never mind go to sleep.

I can’t remember what show was on but for some reason it prompted my hubby to declare that we should go travelling again.

We met over 15 years ago at a roadhouse in the Nothern Territory. We were both on separate journeys that collided together and saw us getting married a mere six months later — but that’s a whole ’nother story!

We are both travellers at heart, but had somehow managed to let life get in the way of our great adventure plans. House, mortgage, comfort zones, jobs we enjoyed, good friends around us, and then much later, kids. You know how it is ...

The idea of travel was so far from my immediate plans. In fact, we had done a three-hour flight to Sydney when our oldest was six months old and it had made me never want to leave the house again.

So when my husband suggested we travel, I chuckled at him like it was the best joke I’d ever heard.

The Sumner family ahead of their big adventure. Picture: Marc McCormack

“Why not?” came his response.

There were so many reasons why I didn’t want to go.

We’ve got kids now, and a dog, and a house full of things, jobs, a mortgage and it’s just WAY TOO SCARY!

Sometimes just getting to the shops and back takes military-style organisation and precision. Australia is much, much bigger than our local Coles, and I manage to lose at least one of the children and most of my sanity whenever we attempt to go there. How would I cope on the Great Ocean Road or the Nullarbor?

Despite my initial resistance, over the next few days I couldn’t get the idea out of my head. Talk of travel crept into almost every conversation and the idea began to seem almost plausible.

We both had jobs in hospitality. My hubby was a supervisor in a restaurant and was working up to 60 hours a week (on a salary). I was on maternity leave from my job managing a backpackers’ hostel.

I had gone back to work when our oldest was only four months old and I was determined to take the full year this time.

I HAD A NIGGLING FEELING THAT I WAS MISSING OUT

But already the months were flying by and my back-to-work date was looming. It wasn’t that I didn’t like my job — I loved it! I just knew what a wrench it was leaving our son at daycare each day. I had this niggling feeling that I would be missing out on so many precious moments that would be impossible to get back.

About the same time, a friend said to me: “Nobody ever said on their deathbed that they wished they’d worked more.”

I think it was this sentiment that got me over the line.

So what if the mortgage took a bit longer to pay off? Or if I didn’t buy any new shoes for a few years (shock horror!)?

We’d be buying memories instead of things and investing in family time rather than the bank balance.

Of course, there were a LOT of practical and boring things to think about before we could get to the romantic sunsets on the beach and star gazing in the desert.

“Although I thank our stars every day for this amazing experience, I’ve found that the harder we worked towards our goal the luckier we became.” Picture: Marc McCormack

We gave ourselves 18 months to organise everything. By that time, we’d have plenty of time to get ready without stress or panic and our youngest would be two years old. Every family is different, but I knew that I needed four walls around us while our youngest was learning to walk, explore and learn about boundaries.

This gave us plenty of time to sort the house out (I’m a bit of an emotional hoarder) and extra work time to save up as much as possible. We wanted to save enough to not have to work for at least a year. Saving also gave us lots of practise in budgeting and tightening our belts.

We spent lots of time figuring out how much money we’d need on the road. We spent Sunday mornings visiting local caravan parks and chatting to families on holiday or on the road. So many people were more than happy to share their tips and let us have a look around their caravans and camper trailers. This was a massive help in deciding which motorhome we should choose.

Closer to our leaving date, we did a couple of “dry runs”. We spent weekends away and did plenty of day trips in our new bus to give us a feel for what it would be like on the road.

One thing we didn’t spend a lot of time doing was planning our route! We excitedly talked about all the places we would visit and watched travel shows when we could, but we wanted our trip to be as spontaneous as possible.

This has worked out really well. So far we have enjoyed following a route that has been guided by people’s recommendations. We’ve also stumbled across so many great spots along the way.

The best tip that I can give anyone wanting to have their own family adventure on the road would be to mentally commit to the idea. Overcoming the objections, fears and excuses in your head is the first step to escaping those comfort zones and start living the dream!

Another thing we hear a lot when people ask us our plans is, “You’re so lucky!”

Although I thank our stars every day for this amazing experience, I’ve found that the harder we worked towards our goal the luckier we became.

This article originally appeared on Kidspot.com.au.